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Defunding the police may have negative consequences

Defunding the police gives the community over to lawlessness and usually results in the very people for whom the movement claims to speak, dying.

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Defund the police sign at base of plinth of Logan Circle statue, Washington, D.C.

Hello, this is Darrell Castle with today’s Castle Report. Today is Friday July 3, 2020. This is the day before the 4th of July when in years past we have celebrated our nation’s founding.1 My office is closed today in honor of Independence Day. But I maintain my lonely vigil high atop the streets of my city. I will be talking about the movement to defund the police in many of our progressive Democrat cities. I will also discuss some of the consequences that are developing from that movement. For the Castle Family everything is just fine as we struggle on against the effects of the virus. The family daughter still stuck but safe thousands of miles away.

What the police do and why we need them

In honor of the 4th I will make this a little shorter today. But I need to say a few words about big city police forces and what is happening to them as they go out each day to face the most violent and relentless people among us.

My observation after more than 40 years of working within the legal system in my city of Memphis, Tennessee as well as other cities around the country is that the authority figures from judges to mayors want and need the support of the police forces in their city. They always have, at least until now, given the police the benefit of the doubt.

One police killing starts city leaders decrying the police?

The killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis changed that perspective. Then city leaders in Democrat cities across the country perhaps got caught up in the moment. So they began to speak out against the police. People were and are upset, not with individual officers but the police in general. Calls to defund them in many places and calls for disbanding them in others became the order of the day. Police morale plummeted as the officers began to feel the city and people, they risked their lives to protect, turning their backs on them. Many officers across the country felt everyone was holding them responsible for what four officers in Minneapolis had done.

The Minneapolis experience

Since this whole movement started in Minneapolis let’s look at that city first. After the George Floyd killing, the city council voted 9 to 0 to completely abolish the city’s police department.2 The vote will require a referendum on the ballot for popular vote in November. But such a vote must have been devastating for police morale. The council quickly voted to fund a private security force for themselves at a cost of $4500 per day each. They deliver the chaos to others through their grandstanding, but sure don’t want to be subject to it themselves. The officers repeatedly expressed the view that they had been abandoned by the city and its people. Those veteran officers eligible for early retirement went ahead and retired and many others just resigned.

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Observe the results

The president of the police union offered to resign but the officers convinced him not to. The executive director of the Minnesota police association said,

Leadership really needs to turn and luck in the mirror. At the state level, at the city level, nobody’s doing that right now.

The result was that the murder rate in Minneapolis skyrocketed virtually overnight. With police not answering calls or at least very few calls the people of Minneapolis apparently decided to amuse themselves by killing each other.

In Seattle and New York

Out in Seattle the summer of love turned into the summer of murder, rape, and robbery much to the chagrin of Mayor Jenny Durkin. She finally ordered the police force to dismantle the foreign country established in the middle of her city.3 She makes the mess and her much maligned police force clean it up.

In New York City mayor De Blasio always has his ear to the ground listening for the rumbles of warnings of evolving progressive agenda items. He came under pressure to defund the police. So on his own authority the NYC police are now absent about one billion dollars in funding. The immediate result was that more than 100 people were shot in NYC last week. How many of them died, its hard to know for sure but it looks like about 15. Twelve more people were shot last Tuesday night which is the last day I could find any numbers. Many officers resigned and hundreds took early retirement from the NYPD.

The Atlanta police also stand down

In Atlanta we find the same story with a slightly different twist. You are probably all familiar with the police shooting outside an Atlanta Wendy’s. That officer was charged with murder before the investigation was complete. Atlanta has a black mayor, a black police chief, and 60% of the Atlanta police force is black. These officers were adamant that the city leadership and the people no longer had their backs. So they just stopped answering calls. The only calls to which they responded were calls where an officer was in trouble or needed help. In other words, they responded to defend their own but not the population. The result of the refusal to answer calls was that from 6 pm Friday the 26th until midnight Sunday, just one weekend, 17 people died on the streets of Atlanta.4

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Los Angeles police feel their city has abandoned them

In Los Angeles police morale is reportedly at an all-time low especially among the rank and file on patrol. According to Breitbart News they feel abandoned by the mayor, all but three of the city council members, as well as the business owners and residents of the city. Mayor Eric Garcetti announced at the height of the riots in June, that he was cutting $150 million from the police budget. Officers are resigning and taking early retirement when it is available and as a result violent crime is increasing.

There is no proactive police work to prevent crime now, only efforts to clean up the mess it leaves behind. Recruiting is down and resignations are up so the police are helping the city defund them. The Hollywood set may get what they want eventually then we will see how they like it. I forget though, they are insulated from the chaos they inflicted on others. Their gates, walls, and most importantly armed guards see to that.

St. Louis: police don’t respond

St. Louis Missouri appears to be another out of control racial conflict zone. A few nights ago, a group of people went down to the St. Louis cathedral, which has a statue of Louis IX for which the city was named, to pray for the city and the cathedral. They came under assault from an angry mob which was apparently angry just because these were white people. The police got six different calls with no response. Witnesses see young black people shooting at other young black people during the daytime protests. The governing authorities in St. Louis seem to be directing their focus toward a white couple standing outside their home with guns during the protest rather than the violence infecting their city.5

Chicago police stand down

As usual folks I saved the best for last. Tthe best goes hands down to the great Democrat city of Chicago. The police in Chicago stood down a long time ago after many attempts to police the south side were rebuffed. In June 557 people were shot and 91 were killed on the streets of Chicago. 91 people dead in one 30-day month is just too incredible to comprehend. The south side of Chicago is literally an out of control war zone. But the mayor says there is nothing she can do but let her streets run red.

Democrat mayors and city councils let their people…die.

In conclusion, Democrat mayors and city councils have been responsible for the deaths of many black people since all this started. Refusal to allow city police forces to work proactively and actively conveys responsibility for those deaths to the city government. There are ways to curtail crime and save lives. But it requires the cooperation of leadership and the will of the people. People must decide if they want to reduce crime and have a safer and more pleasant place to live or not. Would they rather appease the mob and the preening Hollywood types and the wealthy athlete types than protect their residents? Remember that those who advise defunding the police are usually not those in the path of violent criminals.

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Trying to offer better police training and other solutions

Changes in police training and training in how to deescalate without deadly force I would very much favor. The method of proactive policing that would immediately save lives is not lawful because it:

  1. Disproportionately affects black people, and
  2. Clearly violates of the 4th amendment prohibition against unreasonable searches.

That method is called stop and frisk which has been proven to reduce violent crime but for the reasons I have mentioned can’t be done. I suppose its better to just let them kill each other than it is to make difficult non-progressive decisions.

The real solution: stop destroying families

Finally, folks, stop and frisk would probably save hundreds of lives each year. But to really affect crime long term would take an effort over a couple of generations at least. We, as a people, would have to stop incentivizing the breakup and destruction of the human family. Have a great 4th of July folks and stay safe.

At least that’s the way I see it.

Until next time folks,

This is Darrell Castle.

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About the image

“2020.06.09 DC People and Places, Washington, DC USA 161 08015” by tedeytan is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

Editor’s Notes

1 This article arrived on Tuesday 7 July, three days later. Events since the writing of this article might not so much have overtaken it, as borne it out.

2 Here one may read, flowery language and all, the text of the proposed amendment to the Minneapolis city charter. Your editor has heard from at least one apologist, who shall remain nameless here, that the city council did not vote to replace the police department “with a bunch of kumbayah singing hippies.” I quote his language loosely. But I would also challenge him to tell you and me what other effect this proposed amendment would have. Note that, though some “licensed peace officers” will remain, the “kumbayah crew” will supervise them. Note also that the amendment abolishes the “fire police.” Which could mean no one will investigate arson immediately when it happens. !, !, and double !

3 She did so after that “foreign country” committed an act of war: CHAZ/CHOP militia attacked her house.

The Atlanta experience gets worse

4 Worse yet, BLM “protesters” set up an autonomous zone similar to that in Seattle. They set this up near the Wendy’s store where Rayshard Brooks met his end. Or rather, near the shell of that store, which they had burned to the ground. On July 4th itself, two denizens of that zone shot and killed an 8-year-old girl. Police (which the city hasn’t defunded yet!) offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of the shooters. The girl’s father tearfully cried out, “You killed one of your own!” The mayor of Atlanta said, “Enough is enough.”

About the McCloskeys

5 Some articles, to which CNAV will not link, assert that the protesters in that incident behaved in a peaceable manner. They neglect to mention that the protesters broke through and destroyed an iron gate even to get onto that street. Which, furthermore, is a private street; none may enter but community residents. So protesters shouting, “Whose street? Our street!” are not only trespassing but also challenging the ownership of the street. Because they do so not in a court of law, they are in breach of the peace. That, plus their violent means of entry, should give the couple ample reason to act as they did. Then again, these protesters are part of a larger movement that denies the very notion of property. The chant “Whose streets? Our streets!” bespeaks a movement to hold streets and houses alike as community commons.

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Attorney at Law at | dlcastle@castlereport.us | Website | + posts

Darrell Castle is an attorney in Memphis, Tennessee, a former USMC Combat Officer, 2008 Vice Presidential nominee, and 2016 Presidential nominee. Darrell gives his unique analysis of current national and international events from a historical and constitutional perspective. You can subscribe to Darrell's weekly podcast at castlereport.us

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[…] So for the mayors to say black lives matter might be just a little hypocritical. The more they cut police funding, the more they expect police to do to clean up the messes politicians […]

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